


shall not want

by 55anon (Anon)



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Grief/Mourning, M/M, Post-Episode: s12e23 All Along the Watchtower
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-23
Updated: 2018-03-23
Packaged: 2019-04-06 20:07:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,253
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14064594
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anon/pseuds/55anon
Summary: yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death





	shall not want

**Author's Note:**

> Please see endnotes for trigger warnings.

 

Sam is fairly certain there was a time Dean knew how to ask for things.  More than burgers, pie, and beer. He doesn’t remember this time that he is fairly certain existed, but Sam has a lot of things on his conscience and he cannot have this be one of them.  Does not want it to be one of them.

He should have fought harder not to burn the body.  But Dean was determined and when it came to Cas, Sam was never completely certain whether Dean wanted the opposite of what he said, or wanted what he said, or wanted what he didn’t say-- it’s complicated.  He’s pretty sure half the time Dean doesn’t know what he wants until after he has it or until after it’s gone.

Standing in front of the pyre, his brother’s arms slack at his sides-- Sam should have fought harder.  Because sometimes Dean needs someone to fight for what Dean wants, even if it means fighting Dean for it.  It doesn’t make sense. But it’s true. Their lives don’t make sense. Yet Cas had a strange knack for knowing what Dean wanted, and finding a way to give it to him.  The Profound Bond, maybe.

Or the Profoundly Fucked Up Bond, as Claire called it.  They’d been pleasantly buzzed, Dean flirting with the bartender, Sam and Claire sniggering as they bet on which Smooth Dean Winchester Pickup Line (TM) he’d pull next.  Sam took the measure of the barkeep and said she looked like a good target for the “you’re the most special person I’ve ever met where have you been all my life I’ve been waiting for someone like you to settle down and find a home and get a dog--” and okay, maybe he was projecting.

Claire had rolled her eyes, laughing.  She took the measure of Dean and said no woman in their right mind would ever believe him if he pulled that line.  He reeked of that Skynyrd Freebird bullshit. Sam could pull it off, she’d said thoughtfully. But everyone could tell Dean was super high maintenance.

Sam had no idea how she’d come to that conclusion.  He agreed, but he’d thought only he-- and maybe Bobby-- knew that because he was the one who had to live with Dean.  Then Claire went did that thing Sam used to do to _his_ dad.  She glanced at him sideways and made a vague noise like she couldn’t believe he was so out of touch with reality.  The kind of impatient exasperation that said yes, maybe that’s how it used to be in _his_ time (ie ancient history), but could he please get with the program and start living sometime after mixtapes?  Like, closer to Spotify?

After another beer and some friendly squabbling about Jack Nicholson’s versus Heath Ledger’s versions of Joker (which brought the inevitable mention of clowns), Claire had said, apropos of nothing, that Dean was the only person she knew who measured love by the number of times they’d died.

It was an intensely sobering thought.

He should have fought harder to keep Cas’ body.  He should have-- prayed harder. Or something. Looked through the lore.  Read the Bible or something, who knows.

The thing is-- no one knows how to bring an angel back.  Sam knows this fact because Lucifer had already sifted through the fabric of the universe to find a way.  Sam doesn’t even know why Lucifer had dedicated a few billion years researching ways to come back from annihilation.  Honestly, he’d thought Lucifer’s hubris and general tenure as an immortal being would have prevented him from contemplating the possibility of death at all.

It had made Lucifer _furious_ that of all angels, Cas was the one whom God favored above all others.  Especially since Castiel was far from the first angel to exercise free will.  Millions had done so before him. _Lucifer_ was expelled from Heaven and demonized-- literally-- for exercising free will, but _Castiel_ was rewarded endless resurrections.  God worked in mysterious ways, he’d sneered in Sam’s head.

So even if they kept the body, it wouldn’t have made a difference.  If Cas came back, he’d come back envesseled. If he didn’t come back.. then he didn’t come back.  And they’d be stuck with a body in a slaughterhouse freezer.

Dean’s not suicidal.  Sam tells himself this.  Dean is picking on Jack for no reason except for the fact that this is how Dean grieves.  Aside from the fact that he drinks until he’s unconscious because it’s the only way he can fall asleep.

Dean doesn’t say what he wants.  But Dean knows what he wants. Sam is fairly certain.  No-- Sam is certain Dean knows what he wants. Dean said he prayed the Chuck before he started tearing trees to build the pyre.  Jack had wanted to help prepare Cas’ body and Dean lost his shit.

It takes a really long time for a body to burn.  A really, really long time. Dean sucked out all the gas in Cas’ truck, grabbed the Impala’s spare fuel, dumped half their lighter fluid and dug out Cas’ zippo lighter from what was left of his hunter kit.  Sam thinks Dean might have found an old tank of propane in the house. When Dean threw in the lighter (not Cas’, Sam noted), the fire blazed immediately. As though Dean didn’t want to leave himself any chances to take Cas off that pyre.

He and Cas didn’t part on good terms.  He and Cas never part on good terms. Sam isn’t certain they ever reunite on good terms.  But Sam thinks this is the first time Cas left a body to burn. When Cas had fallen to the ground, black wings stretched on either side of him, Dean had just.. stood there.  No begging, no pleading, no asking Cas to come back.

Stared, like he didn’t know how to ask for something.  Stood in front of the pyre with an expression on his face like he was watching everything wanted and never asked for-- didn’t know how to ask for-- _couldn’t_ ask for-- burn with Cas’ body.

Sam knows what it’s like to be loved past the point of death.  People say things about loving someone so much they’d walk through fire, go to hell, fight any force, face death itself, etc.  It’s one thing to hear it and believe the hyperbole. It’s another thing to know someone actually went and did it.

And the thing is-- while it’s true being loved past death is suffocating, exhausting, terrifying-- it also becomes something against which you compare all other love.  Sometimes, Sam can’t help but wonder if Eileen, knowing what she does of demons and the supernatural, would be willing to die and endure 40 years of torture for him. He doesn’t _want_ her to.  He doesn’t think he could survive another love as crushing as Dean’s.  But the thought is there.

And the thing is-- Cas--

You don’t come back from the knowledge that someone fought through hell, endured torture, rebelled, fell, died, consumed souls, gave up armies, took on madness, faced Lucifer, endured scorn, shame, humiliation-- did it willingly without flinching at the consequences-- did it for you and would do it again-- _does_ it again-- and returns to you every time--

You don’t come back from that.  It’s at once profound and profoundly fucked up.

Sam should have fought harder to keep the body.

Because Dean had asked.

Chuck didn’t reply.

But Sam should’ve fought harder anyway.

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Allusions to - suicidal thoughts, alcoholism.


End file.
